Earlier this evening, while my husband and daughter went out for haircuts, I
decided to sneak in a little quiet time working on our family history. As I
pondered what my focus would be, I got a little case of "the guilts."
Although I had pulled the 1930 census listings for a few of my direct lines,
I had put off several of them, writing it off as "grunt work" to be
done later when I ran out of more exciting things to do. After all, there weren't
going to be any surprises in this later enumeration. I already knew about these
people. Wrong. I was in for an interesting evening.
Family Members in the Household
I should have known that there could be some surprises in this enumeration.
When the images for New York first went up, I did a manual search for my grandparents.
They were married in November 1929 and I had an address from my aunt's birth
announcement late in 1930 so it was relatively easy to locate them even without
the index. There they were, Joseph and Muriel . . . and Pauline, age one. Huh?
I made a quick call to my mother who then phoned her brother. Neither of them
had ever heard mention of a sister named Pauline. Family scandal? Not this time.
As it turns out she belongs to another Dennis family that was enumerated at
the same address. Still it should have been enough to alert me to the possibilities
that awaited!
Military Service
The biggest surprise by far was in the entry for my great-grandfather, John
Mekalski (spelled Menkalski for this enumeration). We are very fortunate in
that my grandmother used to share many stories about "Jaja" and their
family growing up. When I found his entry, I scanned it on the image I had printed
out, saw nothing of particular interest and put it aside. I faxed a copy to
my dad, but thought it might be easier for him to read a transcription since
the census pages don't always fax well. So I downloaded some of the free 1930
forms and sat down to write in all the information so that dad could read it
more easily. As I came to the columns at the end of the line, I copied, "Yes"
and in the following column "Sp." What was this? These were columns
for veterans. I had never heard any stories of Jaja being in the Spanish American
War, but here in the census he was listed as a veteran of that conflict. I immediately
called my dad who confirmed that yes, he had heard his mom talk about Jaja serving,
but never saw any evidence, and thus, forgot about it.
Later, after methodically beating my head against the wall for a time, I went
off in search of information on locating the records of those who served in
the Spanish American War at both Ancestry.com and the National Archives and
Records Administration (NARA). Ancestry.com has indexes
of Spanish American
War volunteers for Connecticut, Indiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina,
Ohio, and Oregon.
Although Jaja settled in Cleveland, in 1898 he would have still been living
out east, in either Pennsylvania or New Jersey--something I am still trying
to pin down--so the Ohio records weren't helpful. A listing in one of these
databases would have helped me in requesting his military service records from
the National Archives, but I was still elated with this new lead and moved on
to the National Archives website for more information on how to proceed. Between
the website and NARA's Guide to Genealogical Research in the National Archives
of the United States, I now have a better idea on how to proceed and am
now planning a trip to the NARA Great Lakes Region-Chicago to view some films.
(We'll follow-up on this in a later article.)
Immigration and Citizenship Status
Of course, after that find, what I had previously considered grunt work was
now an obsession. I set about searching for more information. As I pulled my
other paternal great-grandparents enumeration, I was reminded that I still needed
to look for their naturalization records. The 1920 census also showed that they
were naturalized and gave the year as 1914 and although we've done some looking,
we have not yet been able to locate the records. This is partially because we
haven't been able to determine exactly where they were in 1914, but this enumeration
supporting their citizenship status has inspired me to look further.
Age at First Marriage
Now that I had pulled entries for my direct ancestors, I could relax --or not!
Now it was time to focus on collateral relatives. In several cases, I was able
to locate siblings of ancestors and estimate their marriage dates using the
age at first marriage as given in the 1930 Census. This will be helpful in requesting
marriage records, which I'm hoping will reference other family members serving
as witnesses.
Every Name Index
Apart from the clues found in information provided to enumerators, just knowing
where families are in 1930 can be a huge help in locating other records and
in estimating dates. With the every-name national index, it is easier than ever
to locate families, even if you aren't quite sure where they were.
If you're having trouble locating a family, make sure you make good use of the
every-name feature. Try searching for other family members' given names and
play around with the criteria you specify in the search template. It's best
to start wide and try to narrow down your focus. If the surname doesn't come
up at all, try the following:
Search for variants (a no-brainer, but had to be said). Try sounding it
out and use an accent to help see where the name may have been misinterpreted.
Search for given names alone with more precise locations, age, and/or birthplace.
Use wildcards (See the article here
for more information on wildcard searches)
Check the Soundex box to enable searches for other names with the same Soundex
code.
See if you have an address from around 1930 and use it to search for them
manually.
A Few Last Tips
TRANSCRIBE THE ENTRY. I can't emphasize this enough. It's so easy to miss something
when you're just scanning the entry. By transcribing it, you not only get a
more readable copy, but you are forcing yourself to look at each and every column
and get the most from each enumeration.
PRINTING. The best way to print images of the 1930 Census from Ancestry.com
will vary depending on your own computer and printer capabilities. It is recommended
that you use the Advanced Viewer if at all possible. To get the best view of
the image, zoom in to the desired size, centering over the information you want
to print. (The "select" box is great for this, as is selecting "Fit
Width" in the zoom drop-down menu.) Make sure your print preferences are
set to landscape, and when the print dialog box comes up, under Print, select
"Current View."
Another option would be to save the image to your hard drive and print it from
image viewing/editing software. While this may not work for everyone, I have
found that the Windows Picture and Fax Viewer that came with Windows XP Pro
does a good job for me. It sizes, centers, and rotates the image to fit perfectly
and prints it with a small strip of space around the edges for my source citation.
This is going to be the best bet for those who can't use the Advanced Viewer,
as the print from the Basic Viewer is typically too small to read.
SHARE YOUR FINDINGS. Be sure to share what you've found with family members.
I am sending off a copy of this census to my Aunt Sophie who was 18 at the time
of the 1930 enumeration. She'll probably enjoy seeing it and I'm hoping it will
spur more memories that she'll share with me for our family history. It also
creates an opportunity to connect with your living family and share some of
the fun. After all, isn't that why we do it?
Juliana Smith is the editor of the Ancestry Daily News and author
of The Ancestry Family Historian's Address Book. She has written for
Ancestry Magazine and Genealogical Computing. Juliana can be reached
by e-mail at: editor@ancestry.com,
but regrets that she is unable to assist with personal research.
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